Hello,
as you may see I'm not a handy guy.. I tried making a small window bench with 2x4's. I attached them together using just nails but I did not use wood glue. I totally forgot about it..
will the nails eventually pop-out ? the bench is not finished yet but the wood are attched.. is sturdy now but I don't know if there is a way to fix this or just leave it like that and learn from the experience...
suggestion please...
TIA, CZ
Leave it as is. If you built it well it will probably last for years without glue. I recall when I was a boy we had a porch swing my father built. He used only nails, mostly because that was all that was available at the time. That would have been in the 1930s and it lasted up into the 50s at least. Maybe into the 60s, I left about that time and don't know for sure when it finally went out completely. I do know with 4 kids it got a lot of use.
Bill
I agree with Bill. If it isn't broken, don't fix it. If there's a weak spot you may be able to use a 90* bracket to strengthen that joint. I too witnessed many projects that my father built with nails that lasted for many years. In other words, don't sweat it until you need to!
No real disagreement w/ others who say well enough...just a couple of other comments.
Unless you prepared surfaces to mate better than a store-bought 2x4 stud, the quality of the glue joint probably wouldn't be sufficient to last very long, anyway. And, of course, depending on which way pieces are joined, glue on end grain is of no bonding strength, anyway.
How long and how well it holds up will depend mostly on whether the design is such that it has sufficient supporting material in the right places to take the loads applied, whatever they will be, in a direction that isn't parallel to the direction the nails run--that is, if there's a load that tends to twist a piece downward and the nails that hold that piece are in line w/ that force, it will tend over time to pull them out. If the force is perpendicular to that direction, then they take the force laterally. Also, of course, it assumes you used nails of sufficient size and in sufficient quantity. :) A screw or two in judicious locations might be of some value...
--
Some would suggest you dismantle your home and reconstruct it using glue...
On 6/1/2008 6:15 AM Cesar Zapata spake thus:
Kinda hard to advise you since you gave no details on the bench (size and other construction details) but yes, in general, furniture nailed together will eventually loosen (I assume people will be sitting on this?).
You might be able to stiffen it up by adding other connectors between the wood members. The ugly and kinda stupid way would be to use things like metal angle brackets screwed in. You could also drill and glue in wood dowels.
Or start over with a different design altogether ...
thanks for the advice everybody.. I'm new at building but that is the way you learn... I guess.
thanks guys...
On 6/1/2008 3:35 PM Cesar Zapata spake thus:
Yep; the way you learn is, you guessed it: by making mistakes. (Hopefully not the same mistake twice.)
David Nebenzahl wrote in news:484325fb$0$4937 $ snipped-for-privacy@news.adtechcomputers.com:
Learning from your own mistakes is experience. Learning from other people's mistakes is wisdom...
I don't know if this applies to your situation.
Nails will pull out. Usually I guess the top piece of wood bends away from the bottom and pulls out the nail.
One way to prevent this is by putting in two nails where you might have used only one, one leaning in one direction and the other leaning in the other direction. Each one keeps the two pieces of wood from moving with regard to the other.
Since you already have one nail in probably perpendicular to the wood, you could still put a second nail in at an angle. Make sure you still hit the second piece of wood. :)
Or maybe you could wait until it started to come apart, learn how long that took, and then put in the additional nails at the proper places.
HomeOwnersHub website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.